Adventures in sewing – by men, for men.

McCall’s 5252 Hoodie, Part 2

Today I spent some time in the Line of Selvage Design Studio (my basement) settling on a design for my hoodie.

The Real Project

I plan to make a muslin to test pattern sizing, since it is reported to run so large. Since I have both black and grey sweatshirt fleece, I want to have some color blocking fun with it.

But while rifling through my fabric stash for some fabric to use for pocketing, I came across this discovery:

These strips of striped knit ribbing, purchased from Fabric Outlet, match up PERFECTLY with the charcoal grey sweatshirt fabric.

And that’s when the vision for the finished product took shape.

Charcoal grey bodice and sleeves, with black colorblocking on the front yoke and hood. Knit cuffs and waistband. I have a 24-inch separating zipper for the front, in white, that will pick up the white stripe on the knit cuffs. I have both black and white cord for the drawstring on the hoodie.

I auditioned both black and white zippers against the charcoal gray fabric. These will be used for the pockets, and will pick up the white line of the main zipper.

Though black zippers look sharp, white zippers work surprisingly well. Since I only have a white separating zipper in proper length for the front, I’m going to stick with white zippers on the pockets.

For the pocket lining, I have my choice of black and white prints from my stash. The white “Estes Skateboarding” print has shown up in more projects than I care to count, and I still have some left.

So, If this all turns out, this could be one sharp-looking monochromatic hoodie.

And that’s when I had my second realization: I want it to turn out. Which means it’s no longer a muslin.

The Real Muslin

So, I put everything away and decided to switch gears to making a muslin with this cut of jersey sweatshirt fleece.

To recap, here’s the things I plan on doing differently from the pattern:

I’ll add knit ribbing on the cuffs and waistband.

I’ll add a drawstring to the hood.

I’ll add zippers to the three pockets.

I’ll also use the muslin as an opportunity to test these pattern modifications. I haven’t done many zippers before, but I found the instructions for installing a centered zipper in Nancy Zieman’s Sewing A to Z. The drawstring on the hood involves some quality time with a pair of grommet pliers, so I’m glad to have a chance to try it on a test garment first.

The fabric means that the muslin will have some stripe-matching to do. But if this turns out wearable, it should look nice too.

Next Time

We belt out the muslin, check fit, and see how well the zippers went in.

Thanks for sharing. I just finished a T-shirt without knit ribbing. Yes, it work out great. I cut a bias from the same material, and for the neck I decrease the size to 15% of the whole collar. As far as zipper. This is what I learned, use fabric glue for basting. The reason? Pinning does not work well.
Looking foward to see the finish project. Disregard this if you already know
Mahalo